


Chwedl, Hanes, Mabinogi

by Anonymous



Category: Dark Is Rising Sequence - Susan Cooper
Genre: Other, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-19
Updated: 2008-09-19
Packaged: 2017-10-02 00:21:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even if no one tells a story, it can still be told.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chwedl, Hanes, Mabinogi

**Author's Note:**

> For [Roz](http://roz_mcclure.livejournal.com) for her birthday in 2005. The title is three Welsh words for "tale, story, legend"; chwedl is a tale, a legend, a fable that represents a deeper truth. The only time it is important for one's self-preservation to distinguish it from hanes is when describing a piece of gossip passed on—when to call it a chwedl would perhaps be to convey the impression of a lie. Hanes is history, story as a narrative of presumably actual events. The hymn quoted is from William Williams's 1745 "Welsh Hymn."

There was another morning when it rained before Will woke up, rained without any noise on the grass that stretched forever over the mountains. But he didn't think of that. He thought only of the sound of sheep on the slope to the north, the damp breeze on his cheek, and the slight ache in the tops of his thighs from yesterday. His stomach was full of _ffroisen_ and his hands were still warm from the mug of tea he left in the sink after rinsing it out.

"It won't rain again," Bran said from the doorway behind him.

"In Wales?"

"Well. Not today again, at any rate." The light had no colour in it, and neither did the sheep. Bran never had any colour in him—sometimes Will was sure that if Bran slipped and scraped his hands on the rocks, the blood would look like water. The only photograph of Bran that Will had was in black-and-white, and he didn't keep it out on his desk at Oxford. He didn't dare.

His friend looked like a king from another world in the snapshot.

* * *

The new sheepdog—the third since Cafall had died—was a bitch, her left eye surrounded by three splashes of grey, and her bark echoed off the mountains and was absorbed by the dirty, greasy wool of the flock. The lambs were the only ones that looked clean, bright white and charming, and yes, they really do look like the drawings in the children's storybooks.

Wales is very chocolate-box, except that it's not. Wales is real. Everything is real, even if Bran doesn't remember it. Everything did happen, and Will's the only one who knows that.

He's all right with that. Owen Davies died, Will's second year in his course at Oxford, and he missed two tutorials for the funeral. He was all right with that, too, because Bran left his hand on Will's shoulder for three whole breaths, long enough to sing _the crystal fountain whence the healing stream doth flow_.

Afterwards, back at the little farmhouse, with the new sheepdog asleep in front of the Argos, Bran made tea that was sweet enough to make Will's teeth ache. "We had made our peace with one another," Bran said, "and the flock is doing well. We have lost hardly any lambs at all this spring, and John Rowlands's nephew twice removed is the vet in the next town over, which is well. It is easy to trust him."

"Does he sing as John did?" Will asked.

"_Naddo_, which is unfortunate. The church has only one baritone since John died."

"He left you his harp."

"Yes. That he did."

* * *

"Bloody British Rail," Bran said without heat. His rain hat was tilted forward over his eyes, and it dripped just past his nose.

"Shouldn't it be better in Wales?" Will asked, trying to keep his newspaper as dry as he could in air that was made of rain. The headlines had smeared even before he bought it, but he doesn't worry about the headlines when he's with Bran, his friend, his king, even if he's the only one who knows it. Time enough to Watch when he can't see Bran Davies, the raven boy.

Bran chuckled, and it was the driest sound about. "Anything _Seisnig_ gets worse in Wales. Inferiority complex," he added solemnly.

"I do all right," Will said.

"So you do. You're hardly a _Sais, bachgen_."

"Such a compliment," Will drawled, giving up on the paper and sticking it in his coatpocket. He sat next to Bran and stretched his legs out. The train was already fifteen minutes late, and not coming anytime soon.

* * *

No one tells the story of the king and his _dewin_ the way it should be told.

No one knows that story yet. There is a dog in it, a dog with eyes that see the wind, and poetry that no man ever wrote. There are mountains, green like water and memory, and there is rain as soft as kisses and as cold as goodbye. There is skin, and love, and the hard curve and arc of muscle and bone, and sheep on the north mountainside, and tea forgotten for the more intoxicating liquor of the _dewin_'s mouth. There is death, too, because they are king and _dewin_, both well-acquainted with death, near friendly with it, but not in this. In this, they ignore death as best they can, and they are very good at it.

There's no one to tell that story, and it's just as well. It is all right. There will be other mornings.

  
  



End file.
